LOCAL GOVERNMENT SUPERANNUATION (BENEFITS) (NEW TOWNS STAFFS) REGULATIONS, 1958 (Hansard, 30 July 1958)

§ LORD MANCROFT
My Lords, I beg to move that these Regulations and the Scottish Regulations that go with them be approved. They are a little unusual, so I think I ought to give your Lordships a brief explanation of their purpose. The development corporations which are building the new towns have obtained most of their staff from local government service. While serving with the new towns, these people remain part of local government for pensions purposes. Consequently, we had expected that when the development corporations complete their task and are dissolved (as in due course they will have to be), the staff would go back to local government and take their pension rights with them. Recent experience suggests that this may not, after all, be quite so easy.
One or two of the new towns are nearing completion—Crawley and Hemel Hempstead, for example—and some of the staff are already trying to get back into the local government service. They are finding that ten years or so with a new town is not apparently regarded as a useful qualification by local authority establishment committees, but rather as a disadvantage.
I am sorry that this should be so; but that is what these committees appear to think, and the difficulty is that, if the staff cannot get another local government job in twelve months, all they get in the way of pension rights is a return of their own contributions. It would clearly be very hard, particularly on people in their forties who have already many years' service behind them, if they were to lose the benefit of all the contributions which their previous employers have paid on their behalf.
The purpose of these regulations, therefore, is to safeguard the accrued pension rights of new towns' staff who find themselves in this situation. I have no doubt that most of the staff will get other jobs and will not need these special rights, but as I have said, some of them may be in real difficulty.
The more important provisions of the Regulations are pretty clearly described in the explanatory notes. I should only 484 like to add this. Your Lordships debate the new towns from time to time, and we generally range over questions of high policy, as it is natural that we should. We do not always remember the staff, without whose work the towns could never have become the success they undoubtedly are. I think your Lordships will agree that if any of these officers were to suffer hardship through entering into the new towns service, it would be wrong for the Government to do nothing to help them. I hope your Lordships will also agree that these Regulations meet the case satisfactorily. I beg to move that the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper be agreed to.

§ LORD SILKIN
My Lords, I should like to take perhaps a somewhat belated opportunity of expressing my own appreciation, and I am sure that of my noble friends, of the great work that has been done on behalf of the new towns by their officers. I entirely agree with the noble Lord that the success which the new towns have achieved is in a large measure attributable to the devoted service of these officers. In fact, to my knowledge, many of them gave up far better positions which they had been holding because they were devoted to the ideal of creating something fresh. Therefore, I welcome these Regulations. It would be monstrous if, as a result of their self-sacrifice, these people suffered eventually in connection with their pensions.
I take it that this scheme applies only to people who have come from local government service and that adequate provision has been made for those who came from outside. At any rate, these Regulations do not deal with them. I realise, and I know that many officers who came from local government service realised, the problem which would arise on their going back when the new towns were substantially completed. I imagine that there will be no great difficulty in men of forty or forty-five getting good jobs, possibly better jobs than they held before, because of the additional experience they have had in connection with the new towns—a wide and valuable experience. But there may be difficulty 485 in the case of men who are within a few years of the retiring age. I take it that in the main these Regulations are intended to help people who may find it difficult to get other jobs in view of the short service they will then be able to offer. I should like to ask one question. I believe that the answer is that the officers have been consulted through their organisation, but I should like to be assured that these Regulations meet with their complete satisfaction. Subject to that, we welcome the Regulations and we are glad that the Government have thought it right to make them.

§ EARL WINTERTON
My Lords, may I, as one who, when a Member of another place, had one of these new towns in his constituency and took a great interest in its creation—namely, Crawley—not only support what the noble Lord, Lord Mancroft, has said but also express my gratitude for what the noble Lord representing the Front Opposition Bench has said. I may say that he and f and others taking an interest in the new towns were very concerned, almost horrified, to hear what the Minister had to say about what I can only describe as the reactionary attitude of certain local authorities. Although the matter is slightly outside the ambit of the Regulations, I wonder whether any legitimate pressure can be put on local authorities by the Government to take back these people. If that is not possible, the noble Lord, when he answers, might also deal with the question, whether it would be possible for the Government to bring to the notice of ordinary industrial undertakings the value of these men and how useful their services would be to those undertakings.

§ LORD MANCROFT
My Lords, I am grateful to the House for the friendly welcome given to these Regulations. I can assure the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, that the professional associations have been consulted and have agreed. I can promise my noble friend Earl Winterton that such discreet pressure as is possible will be put on local authorities to take these people back. There will only be a few of them, but, even so, I think it is right that the few should have their interests properly looked after.